I'm a privacy pragmatist, writing about the intersection of law, technology, social media and our personal information. If you have story ideas or tips, e-mail me at khill@forbes.com. PGP key here.
These days, I'm a senior online editor at Forbes. I was previously an editor at Above the Law, a legal blog, relying on the legal knowledge gained from two years working for corporate law firm Covington & Burling -- a Cliff's Notes version of law school.
In the past, I've been found slaving away as an intern in midtown Manhattan at The Week Magazine, in Hong Kong at the International Herald Tribune, and in D.C. at the Washington Examiner. I also spent a few years traveling the world managing educational programs for international journalists for the National Press Foundation.
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“We need to fight for our privacy or we will lose it,” said Google chairman Eric Schmidt to Reuters in a recent on-camera chat. “[All of the user generated material on the web] is a privacy nightmare especially if you’re 15.”

Schmidt noted that the justice system will wipe a kid’s criminal record when he or she turns 18, but if a teenager does something incredibly stupid on the Internet — like sending out racist tweets about the president — “it’s going to follow you for the rest of your life,” he said.

“I’d argue for those of you with teenagers and preteens, you should probably have the online talk before the sex talk with your kids,” advised Schmidt. In other words, talk to them about virality before STDs.

Schmidt’s own daughters are well past the age where they need the birds, bees, and bits talk, but a new survey from the Pew Center and the Berkman Center suggests that today’s parents are well aware of the need to talk to their kids about their online bodies.

In a survey of 802 parents and their teens, parents were particularly freaked out by their kids mixing it up with strangers online, but “reputation management” and “impact on future opportunities” also rated high when it came to the worries that keep them up at night. And across the board, parents are worried about the information advertisers are collecting from their kids.

As for the 15% of parents who are “not at all concerned” about how their child manages their reputation online, please read this article.

A good number of parents are acting on these worries and counseling their kids on “Just Saying No To Being Stupid Online.” Via Pew:

59% of the parents of teen users of social networking sites (SNS) have talked with their child because they were concerned about something posted to their profile or account. (That translates to 46% of parents of all online teens.)

39% of the parents of teen users of SNS have helped their child set up privacy settings for a social networking site. (That translates to 31% of parents of all online teens.)

Pew revealed there’s a big privacy awareness gap when it comes to household income and race though:

And of course, rather than just talking to their kids, some parents are actively monitoring them. Half of the parents surveyed say they use parental controls on electronic devices or software to monitor, block, and filter what their kids see.

In a focus group, one 14-year-old boy says his parents simply monitor him and his siblings by friending them on Facebook, and he doesn’t mind: “We don’t have to worry much about what we put up, because what we put up we know that our family is going to see, so it’s like if there’s something that we don’t want—I remember like my mom told me don’t put anything you wouldn’t want your grandparents to see or something.”

But of course, others are savvy enough with their privacy controls to outsmart their parents. Another 14 year old: “So it’s like, now when they go online, they see info, and then it’s like — they see, like, my likes and interests [...] but they don’t see my posts, see my pictures…”

Meanwhile, 42% of parents Googled (or Binged) their kids to “see what information is available about him or her.” The percentage of parents who do this shoots up to 61% when their kids are 17, i.e., applying for college. (This is also a good thing to do before your baby even arrives, just to see what kind of online footprint exists for your proposed name.)

Astonishingly, 44% said they’d actually read the privacy policies of websites or social networking sites that their child uses. Bravo, parents. Apparently, there are people in the world who read privacy policies.

So, it’s fair to say that Schmidt’s words are not landing on deaf ears. Though it’s hard to say whether “the talk” will result in kids practicing “safe surfing.”

“We’ve got a real problem,” said Schmidt at the end of the Reuters interview. “We’re going to bear the cost of people being inattentive to the fact that there is no delete button on the Internet and that it’s easy to lose your privacy. That’s my basic message: It’s in our control, it’s in our behavior and in the way we advocate things.”

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Google’s era under Eric Schmidt had involved into multiple crimes in Stanford which is fascism by nature.

Google’s Eric Schmidt had abused Google resources to financially and politically support a criminal suspect named Gabriele Scheler, along with a Stanford Computer Science faculty Sebastian Thrun, against ruling from Stanford and police authorities. During their fight with Stanford, Eric Schmidt’s side had murdered an innocent Stanford student May Zhou in 2007 to threaten me and to terrorize Stanford. When they found I would not compromise a bit but actively tried to clarify the case, Eric Schmidt’s side did plot a murder on me as well. The only reason they didn’t make it a reality is because they were closely watched by police and they are afraid of leaving evidence (not because they have any mercy on me as a human being, fascism by nature.) Eric Schmidt lost his CEO position because of his involvement into these crimes.

These accusations stand still which Eric Schmidt and Sebastian Thrun dare not deny to the public. Eric Schmidt and Sebastian Thrun had not paid for their crimes and they would have to.

Sebastian Thrun/Eric Schmidt/Gabriele Scheler/Angela Merkel/Ed Feigenbaum/Kaifu Lee, etc. had lost his credibility when he got involved into fascism crimes which had endangered human lives —————————————————— There is actually a war between fascism and anti-fascism, at this stage, fascism still prevails in our lives, Eric Schmidt, Sebastian Thrun and Gabriele Scheler are just front figures we could see in this fascism circle, there is a whole pack of fascists behind them Eric, as we can see, starting from Gabriele Scheler’s atrocity case on Stanford campus back in 2004, many people, including Gabriele Scheler, Sebastian Thrun, you Eric Schmidt, Professor Ed Feigenbaum of Sebastian Thrun’s boss in Stanford Computer Science department, a big donor CCC of Stanford Computer Science department, and also Eric Schmidt’s colleague in China Kaifu Lee, had made contributions to such fascism crimes which had cost human life of Stanford student May Zhou and crimes which had retaliated on victims and almost cost life of the victim as I am … … … and someone who had provided legal coverage for your fascism crimes, including a powerful officer from Santa Clara DA Office, namely ZZZ (and after ZZZ, another officer YYY), and the officer VVV who’s in charge of Gabriele Scheler’s case and who had further collateralled with your side(suspect Eric Schmidt, Sebastian Thrun and Gabriele Scheler’s side) to conspire and curse victims( Stanford, May Zhou, me) in every possible way since 2006 till today; and maybe include the officer RRR who insist on May Zhou’s death as a suicide or accident, even though I had clearly pointed out who’s involved in May Zhou’s murder case … … … and someone who could provide political support for your fascism crimes, including top politician from the country of Germany whom we all know — Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, and maybe include a retired top politician from UK as well, etc. and more and more to find out later … ————————————————— I believe, though some names missed out, all names mentioned in the above comment are part of this fascism circle

Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, had provided political support for a series of fascism crimes which related to a cold-blooded killing of an innocent Stanford student May Zhou (a girl of U.S. citizen, Taiwan origin, MIT alumnus and Stanford Ph.D. candidate) as well as an unsuccessful plotted murder on me, all started from an on campus atrocity case in Stanford University [Stanford Police Case Number: IR #04-111-0335;Victim: Peter Cao; Criminal Suspect: Gabriele Scheler ], in which an extremely irrational Germany lady named Gabriele Scheler had bitterly assaulted me. Chancellor Merkel might as well back up a coup in Stanford after she visited Stanford in 2010, though it was cracked down by California Judicial Authorities in time. It is an interesting question of how much Chancellor Angela Merkel had involved into such series of fascism crimes on land of America. I bet with the intervention of Germany power into these cases, such series of fascism crimes would never be clarified and such fascism crimes on land of America would never be concurred by U.S. Authorities. A very serious offending to the dignity and sovereignty of people of the United States as well as to the whole world of humanity

By the way, the Clintons have built up personal grudge on me, that’s for sure, during this war of fascism vs anti-fascism; That’s heartbreaking if so, since I have admired the Clintons since I learned their names in the early 1990s; I’d tell the Clintons in private voice: miscarriage of justice in going on, please hold up your grudge on me; it’s better when we could learn each other’s opinion with direct communication. my contact caomingpeter@126.com

I applaud Schmidt for his sage, albeit ironic advice, given that Google with its ubiquitous search function is one of the principle enablers of a loss of personal privacy. Schmidt’s advice is akin to the CEO of R.J. Reynolds warning teens about the dangers of smoking. Nonetheless, in both instances, early education is the key to helping the potential smoker or racist tweeter understand the long term, harmful effects of their decisions.

While I see the irony you’re seeing with a cursory glance, your analogy isn’t very accurate. A better analogy would be an energy company warning about the dangers of electrical sockets and being responsible with electricity. This would also be the type of company one would expect to issue such warnings.

With smoking, there is no safe way to smoke. The only way to be responsible with smoking is to never start.

With the Internet, however, there is a lot of good things about it. Due to its size and scope and power, there are also a lot of bad things possible. Google (and other search engines) exist so that we can traverse this vast sea of information. The side effect is that people can use information for both good purposes and for bad purposes.

So, in this case, a search engine is the key type of organization to teach the public about the responsible way to use the Internet, especially when it comes to information availability. It isn’t anything like R.J. Reynolds warning teens about the dangers of smoking.

I agree your analogy is more apt and that there is no responsible way to smoke whereas there is a responsible way to post on the internet. I was not necessarily equating Google with R.J. Reynolds in all aspects. It is instructive, however, to compare the relative potential harm from the company’s respective products. If one stops smoking early enough the harm can be significantly mitigated if not completely erased. The harm from an errant misstep on the web, however, is irreversible due to the fact that Google never forgets. Both of us are essentially saying the same thing…think before you smoke or tweet because there are side effects of both.

Someone from inside of this department had made Stanford Computer Science department play a big role in such series of fascism crimes ((e.g. Sebastian Thrun’s boss in Stanford Computer Science Professor Emeritus Ed Feigenbaum, who had peeked my emails, manipulated my friends and relatives to deceive me/condemn me/be hostile to me, which police told me is crime; and a big donor CCC who manipulated the handling of this case with discriminative favor of Gabriele Scheler/Sebastian Thrun in Stanford, and more, Thrun’s student and colleagues had for sake of Thrun (possibly with guidance of someone as Feigenbaum?) falsely accused me at police which I believe is another set of crime … professor teaches students to commit crime … professor Ed Feigenbaum of Sebastian Thrun’s boss in Stanford Computer Science department is a crime supporter… details later … )) which is highlighted by the killing of an innocent Stanford student May Zhou as well as an unsuccessful plotted murder on me.